Web start-ups get early Christmas gift from Microsoft

BizSpark program gives new companies a three-year free license on business software. Microsoft wants to compete with Google and Zoho.
11/6/2008 6:05:00 AM By: James Niccolai

Microsoft is giving away free software to early-stage Web start-up companies as part of a worldwide program called BizSpark launched on Wednesday.
BizSpark aims to help startups get off the ground by providing production licenses and technical support for several Microsoft products. The licenses are free for the first three years, after which the startups must start to pay.

As well as helping startups, the program gives Microsoft a way to promote the use of its software at a time when open-source alternatives have matured, and as rivals such as Google and Salesforce.com are promoting their cloud platforms for building Web applications.

ZocDoc, a New York-based company that offers an online service for booking doctor and dentist appointments, became an early pilot member of the BizSpark program. It received licenses for Microsoft's Visual Studio, SQL Server and Windows Server products.

"We're getting all the Microsoft software for free, so that's great for a startup like us trying to keep our costs low," said CTO and Cofounder Nick Ganju. "Some of these software packages can get pretty expensive so it's great to be able to keep our software free for the first few years."

Other products covered by the program include Office SharePoint Portal Server, BizTalk Server and Systems Center, with Dynamics CRM to be added soon. Startups also get a subscription to the Microsoft Developer Network and a Community Technology Preview of Microsoft's Azure cloud software announced last week.

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